Uncharacteristic Errors Doom Germany in Euro 2016 Semi-Final vs. France

Germany's dream of becoming only the third to team to hold the World Cup and the Coupe Henri-Delaunay at the same time came to an abrupt end on Thursday night in Marseille's Stade Velodrome.

The 2-0 defeat at the hands of host nation France in the semi-final of Euro 2016 was hard to grasp, for it felt so unnecessary.

One would be hard-pressed to find someone who believes Les Bleus were the better side in the match. The world champions dictated the run of play for much of the 90 minutes but lacked that little bit of decisiveness going forward and some concentration at the back.

That's not necessarily to say France were undeserved winners, of course. The hosts rose to the occasion, playing arguably their best match of the tournament, and, unlike their opponents, they were clinical on the attack and defended consistently over the course of the match.

The French came out strongly, clearly trying to surprise a makeshift Germany side in the opening minutes of the game. In Mats Hummels, Sami Khedira and Mario Gomez, three key starters missed the match, and the World Cup holders needed a few minutes to settle in.

Lars Baron/Getty Images

Head coach Joachim Low changed his system to match France's powerful midfield and included Liverpool's Emre Can in the starting XI. It was a big call, seeing as the 22-year-old had not played a single minute at the Euros to that point and never played in central midfield for the national team in his six previous caps. 

Like the team in general, it took Can a while to get settled, with some nervy touches and passes going awry in the first 10 minutes or so.

Germany were lucky France didn't capitalise on their forceful start when Antoine Griezmann and Blaise Matuidi combined through their defensive lines with ease after seven minutes. The Atletico Madrid man's effort on goal didn't match the brilliance of the move itself, and Manuel Neuer was never going to let the relatively weak shot in, but it was a sign of things to come.

After that first chance of the match, however, the world champions kicked into another gear and arguably played their best football of the tournament for a 30-minute stretch. 

"Schweinsteiger and Kroos wove their spidery webs increasingly closer to France 'keeper Hugo Lloris' goal," Gabriele Marcotti wrote for ESPN FC. "Can thundered his way through the middle, sometimes becoming a de facto adjunct striker. Lloris had to make a tremendous strong-handed stop from Can's deflected snap shot, which bounced on the way in. And Schweinsteiger fired high."

Even though clear-cut scoring opportunities were few and far between, a lead for the Germans felt inevitable, although France indicated they could cause problems in the transition game. Had the result been different at the end of the night, many would have identified Benedikt Howedes' brilliantly timed sliding challenge on Olivier Giroud late in the first period as the key situation of the game.

Two minutes into stoppage time, a different kind of block undid the German dominance. The second silly penalty for a raised hand in as many games, it was team captain Schweinsteiger, of all people, who doomed his team. 

"It was a reflex," the 31-year-old said after the match, per Raphael Honigstein for ESPN FC. "It's always difficult when you mark zonally, there's so much movement."

Since left-back Jonas Hector had needlessly put the ball out of play for the corner preceding the incident, the penalty was preventable in two ways. A simple lack of communication before the set piece and a lack of coordination on Schweinsteiger's part can make all the difference in this kind of match.

Germany weren't as dominant after the break and failed to create much until Griezmann doubled France's lead with another goal the world champions simply cannot concede at this level.

Two hurried passes in their own box, from Schweinsteiger to Howedes to Kimmich, invited Paul Pogba to press the young Bayern Munich defender. The Juventus man then got past the 21-year-old with a simple turn of his hips, whipping in a ball towards Giroud. Neuer came to claim it but could only palm it into the middle, where Griezmann waited and poked home.

With only 18 minutes of regulation to go from that point, Germany threw the kitchen sink at France, but—apart from a Kimmich shot that hit the woodwork—their attacks lacked precision and determination.

Lloris had to make a brilliant stop in the third minute of stoppage time when Kimmich headed a ball toward his goal and Thomas Muller deflected it, but that was it.

It was a game of small margins, historically the environment Germany thrive in, but not on Thursday. Low said after the game, per Marcotti, that his side had done nothing wrong:

"

I have to compliment my players. We were the better team. It was just bad luck that we conceded. We still created the best chances. We didn't have the luck we needed.

At the World Cup in 2010 and at the Euros in 2012, we were eliminated in the semi-finals by opponents [Spain and Italy, respectively] who were better than us. Today, that wasn't the case. We were better than the French.

"

The team echoed that sentiment, with Kroos even calling it Germany's best performance of the Euros in an interview with German broadcaster ZDF after the match.

While true for stretches of the first half, that statement sounded like a joke after full-time.

Conceding two avoidable, silly goals was out of character for the usually ruthless World Cup holders, who also lacked a cutting edge going forward. The absence of Gomez hit Germany the hardest.

With Mario Gotze out of form, it was Muller who led the line. "My game was tonight typical of our team on a whole," the Bayern star conceded after the match, per Honigstein. "We worked hard but got nothing in return."

"It characterised a curious tournament for Muller, who did not score in these finals and rarely came close," Nick Ames wrote for ESPN FC, calling the 26-year-old "a peripheral figure."

Germany's surprising lack of firepower was a general theme at the Euros, as blogger Christopher Ramm pointed out on Twitter (link in German).

It was the second time in six matches in France that Germany didn't score a goal, and in two more they scored only once. The lack of form from Muller and Gotze, as well as the jumpy nature of Julian Draxler's performances and a dearth of options from the bench proved too big to overcome in the end.

The match in Marseille was still very much a winnable one for Germany, which will make their defeat all the more painful. Despite their key absences—which included Boateng, who suffered an apparent thigh injury in the second half—the world champions were in a position to beat France. Uncharacteristically, they let the hosts off the hook.

What remains is a tournament in which they looked like the best team for large stretches and finally beat bogey team Italy in the quarter-finals, only to go out due to small lapses of concentration against host nation France—a team they hadn't lost a meaningful match against since 1958.

Lars Pollmann is a Featured Columnist who also writes for YellowWallPod.com. You can follow him on Twitter.